1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a gaming machine that is capable of repeatedly executing a unit game.
2. Background of the Related Art
Conventionally, it has been known that there is provided a gaming machine played in such a manner that a player presses a spin button subsequent to entry of a gaming medium such as a coin, whereby symbols that are displayed for the player when a plurality of reels are stopped are determined by lottery processing; scrolling of symbol arrays of a respective one of the reels are started; the scrolling is stopped so that the determined symbols are displayed for the player, and then, the symbols are rearranged; it is determined whether or not a combination of the displayed symbols is associated with a prize; and in a case where the combination of the displayed symbols is associated with the prize, a bonus according to a kind of the winning combination of the symbols is awarded to the player.
In such a gaming machine, an allowable number of payouts at the time of a bonus game is determined and set as triggered by a prize of BB according to activation of a bonus (for example, refer to Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2007-20954). According to this gaming machine, a player can play a bonus game until the set allowable number of payouts has been reached.
However, in such a gaming machine, after a player has won the prize of BB according to actuation of a bonus, the game is merely played until the medals of which the allowable number of payouts is determined has been paid out. Therefore, the player merely consumes the predetermined allowable number of payouts and thus a variety of game patterns could not imparted to the player in a bonus game.
Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide a gaming machine which is configured to respectively determine values of symbols according to a prize so that a total of the values of these symbols is obtained as the number of free games that can be played at the time of the play of a bonus game, the gaming machine being configured to enable a player to select another bonus game that is different from such free games, whereby diversified variations can be imparted to the play of the bonus game.
Also, it is a further object of the present invention to provide a gaming machine in which another bonus game having an expectation value which is equal to an expectation value of the number of payouts according to a free game is configured based on the number of games which is smaller than that of free games, whereby a player can select either one of two bonus games, based on the player's preference for game or an allowable game playing time or the like, without a need to worry about an advantage or a disadvantage relevant to the number of payouts.